Killer manga
by Fomalhaut
Summary: A famous Japanese manga writer gets killed after a meeting with fans, with the name of one of his characters carved into his chest. Mainly concentrated on investigation, please R&R! FINALLY UPDATED! Is Greg a manga fan?
1. Chapter 1

**Maybe I have read too much Hellsing... anyway, here goes the introduction/prologue. This is gonna be mainly concentrated on investigation, no pairings/long lost children of the CSIs etc. Sorry.

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It was almost midnight, and Hiro Ukita was walking towards his hotel from a wonderful but tiring meeting with his fans. He had signed so many volumes of his manga that his right hand was terribly aching. So far, 11 volumes had been released, and there was great excitement about the 12th and last one, which was to hit the stores and the Internet in two weeks. Despite of all the fans nagging him with questions, he wasn't going to give out anything about the ending – smiling, he only left a hint there was going to be a great twist.**

_Bloodhunters_. The manga that was driving fans mad.

That cold winter night he decided to walk to the hotel, rather than taking a taxi. The icy air somehow refreshed his thoughts, and wiped away the sound of the fans' voice, screaming, laughing, cheering, asking questions…

He was just crossing a bridge over a dry riverbed, when he heard a shriek behind him.

"Huh?" he turned around.

Next morning, at around 10 AM, the yellow cordon surrounded by an incredulous crowd the CSI team was already busy photographing and taking evidence from Hiro Ukita's corpse, who had been pushed down the bridge, where he died instantly hitting the frozen ground.

"This is weird…" Grissom looked down at the body, which was lying on its back "what's this?"

His chest was bloodied. Opening his coat and his shirt, he could see that the murderer actually _carved something in his chest_ with a sharp knife.

"_Roxier_…" he read it out "what is this supposed to mean?"


	2. Chapter 2

**Thanks for the reviews. Oh, please tell me who/what do you suspect!**

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**"Is that him? No! Why? Let me there!" a girl screamed, trying to break through the cordon.  
"I'm sorry miss, this is a crime scene, you can't be here, this is a crime scene!" a policeman blocked her way.  
"But we were supposed to meet!" screamed another one.  
"It was the second day of the meeting! I prepared my costume for ages!" shouted a boy wearing a long blue wig, a soldier's helmet and full uniform.  
"You, cosplaying as Roxier, stand back!" Greg arrived at the scene.  
"Huh?" Grissom raised his head.  
"Roxier is one of the chracters, why? …oh." Greg noticed the carving only then.  
"And just how do you know?"  
"… that does not count now. Let me see." 

At the morgue

Dr. Al Robbins examined Hiro Ukita's corpse.

"The carving was clearly added post mortem; cause of death is injuries from falling. You can see clearly he was pushed" he showed two spots on his shoulders "other than that, I can only tell the carving was made with a fine, straight knife. You may find more evidence on his clothes, maybe. Oh, one more thing…"

And with this he handed Grissom a packet with skin cells found under Hiro Ukita's nails.

The lab

Meanwhile, Sara and Nick were already occupied with his clothing. There was no blood on it, apart from the chest area.  
"Look here… it doesn't seem this happened during the fall" she showed him one of his sleeves was torn "maybe he fought with the murderer."  
"He seems a strong man… if he did, maybe we're looking for someone who's a sport champion, or similar."  
"Hmm… Sara noticed some yellow substance on his shoulder "I'm taking this to the lab."  
The yellow substance soon turned out to be simple body paint, which could be found in almost any shop around town.

Back at the scene

Grissom examined a hair clip found beside the body. He lifted a fingerprint from it.

Greg found a library card lying on the bridge. It belonged to a certain_ Felicity Bell_.

The first suspect

"Felicity" Catherine asked the young black girl "we found your library card."  
"Oh, finally, someone did! I lost it a week ago, and really need it…"  
"Wait. We found it next to a murder victim. Hiro Ukita"  
The girl shook.  
"I didn't do anything! What… wait… you… you mean Hiro Ukita is _dead_?!"  
Catherine nodded. Suddenly Felicity burst into tears.  
"It cannot be! We had a meeting today and tomorrow too, and the interview… I… I am the president of his fan club at the high school…!"  
"I know it's hard, but, since you probably know a lot about him, do you have any idea who could have killed him?"  
"No! Or… maybe… he had some rivals… _Bloodhunters_ is a major success, this probably made several other writers jealous…"  
"Felicity… call me if anything comes to your mind."

"Amanda!" Felicity looked surprised at the blonde girl she met on the corridor "how come?"  
"Do you know each other?" asked Catherine.  
"Yes… she's the vice-president of our fanclub!"

The second suspect

"Amanda, your fingerprint was found on this hair clip, right beside Mr. Ukita's body."  
"And?" she asked.  
"This means you're a suspect."  
"Oh, do me a favour, why would I kill the writer of my favourite manga? I'm not saying more without a lawyer!"

Amanda was in the database for shoplifting a year before.

The third suspect

"Yes, true, I was jealous. And so?" asked Lee Dyson, American manga writer "even more since he noticed that and drew a character which looked remarkably like me and killed it in a brutal way, then added an authro's note saying _find the cameo_!"  
"According to our records, you already lost a trial against him when you sued him for stealing your ideas. Where were you last night?"  
"Home alone."  
Sara noticed some scratches on his arm.  
"Where did you get those?"

Bloodhunters

"Maybe these can help" Nick placed on the table the 11 released volumes of the manga "let's start reading!"

So he and Warrick read through them, raising eyebrows at the several bloody scenes, with vampires, ghouls, zombies, various monsters and merciless mass murderers running around.

"Hey, here's something… look!" said Nick, pointing at a scene in the 11th volume.

_Lovers Roxier and Nika were running from enemy zombies, when they stumbeld upon a rickety bridge. Roxier told Nika to run, and she did so, but, as he tried to follow her, the bridge gave up and he fell._


	3. Chapter 3

**Sorry for the short chapters, there will be great revelations coming soon. And will never have such a long hiatus again! Enjoy, and comment!

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**

Sara, looking at the photographs, noticed Hiro Ukita wore his watch on the arm where the sleeve was torn; hoping she would find something, she tested its strap, and lifted several fingerprints from it. Almost all of them belonged to the manga writer, but one turned up to be that of Felicity Bell, the fanclub president.

"I don't think the one he fought with was the one who ultimately killed him" said Nick, as Sara told him what she had found "he was pushed from behind."

"Well, the murderer could have came back, maybe they fought earlier… what's that?"

"Oh… this?" Nick lifted up _Bloodhunters. Volume 11_ "the thing that drives fans crazy."

"Uhm…" Sara tried hard to think up something to say, eyeing the cover where a vampire was beheading a helpless man, with a blue-haired character and a yellow-skinned girl holding on to each other in the background, suspiciously.

"Oh, and this guy here" Nick pointed at the blue-haired soldier "is _Roxier_. Right in this volume, he fell off a bridge and supposedly die.

"What do you mean _supposedly_?"

"He fell into some deep abyss, and his lover was there crying… this girl here, don't ask me why she has yellow skin."

"Ah, yellow body paint…" Sara's eyes narrowed "let me check…"

"This isn't going to work, is it" she sighed after she checked the photographs taken that day, as Hiro Ukita visiting the Las Vegas Anime Convention was a big event.

On the three photographs released so far, she and Nick could count exactly 26 girls cosplaying as Nika, the yellow-skinned vampire hunter, surrounding Hiro Ukita and asking him for autographs, all of them coated in yellow body paint. Moreover, the pictures didn't even show the whole Convention, which probably counted hundreds more; plus, Nika was not the only yellow manga character, and anyone, really _anyone_, could have accidentally brushed against one of them and get the paint on themselves, perhaps not even noticing.

Sara and Nick had to admit the body paint was a dead end.

* * *

The Anime Convention was stripped of its usual happy atmosphere. Catherine looked at the huge banner depicting Hiro Ukita, proudly announcing that he was coming to visit, now turned into a memorial, with fans placing flowers and lighting candles in front of it.

"Hello, Amanda" Catherine greeted the girl from the day before, now dressed as Nika; she was recognizable, though, as she wore her blonde hair loose, exactly like the character.

"Oh… hello" she said, then lit a candle "it's so terrible… to die the same way Roxier did…"

"Sorry?"

"Roxier… the character… oh well, _him_" Amanda pointed at a bunch of guys, all dressed in soldier's uniforms and wearing blue wigs "he died in the last volume, he fell from a bridge. My costume is that of his lover, Nika."

* * *

"I see a clear connection" said Catherine "I don't think somebody simply wanted to kill Hiro Ukita, and was lucky enough to catch him as he was crossing the bridge. They _wanted_ to kill him that way, maybe following him."

"Or it could have been accidental, Catherine" said Grissom "maybe the murderer pushed him, then decided to carve the name into his chest as a humiliation."

* * *

Meanwhile, Warrick sighed heavily above the bunch of manga volumes. Apart from Roxier's death by falling, he found no promising leads.

"Here" suddenly Greg walked in, and handed him a memory card "maybe this will help."

"Where did you get it, what is it?"

"_My_ memory card. I'd like to get it back, though."

"Oh, but what do we see!" Catherine could barely contain her laughter, as Greg's memory card was full of pictures taken at the AnimeCon, day one.

There was even a snapshot of him proudly standing beside Hiro Ukita, holding a poster of _Bloodhunters_. He was wearing no cosplay, though.

* * *

Felicity, brought in the second time, was visibly scared. She was taken from the AnimeCon, cosplaying as Nika as well, with a blonde wig, and, of course, covered in body paint.

"We have reason to suspect you killed Hiro Ukita, or that you fought with him."


End file.
